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Wednesday, 18 September 2013

Pennies from Heaven

I previously recounted a couple of
anecdotes about Tourists and Missionaries in Swaziland – and here is another disturbing
piece. In recounting this story I have to tread warily and not allow my own
obvious prejudices to intrude . . .

I was recently introduced to an
organisation, an NGO - actually more technically a FBO (Faith Based
Organisation) that is involved with the feeding of OVC’s. OVC’s are
incidentally “orphans and vulnerable children” which in Swaziland represent an
inordinately high percentage of the population.

This organisation apparently sets up “feeding
points” and provides meals for the OVC’s in the immediate vicinity. Quite how
these points are set up in the first place I am not certain and the person explaining
this to me (an expatriate) could not explain the relationship between the NGO
and the local Traditional Authorities or for that matter Regional or Central Government.
The organisation provides pre-schooling and some form of post high school
skills training – although what these skills are I could not establish. They
also run after-school activities such as bible classes. The NGO seems to be run
by a preponderance of expatriates.

My defensive antennae immediately spring up
when introduced to an organisation that has a heavy foreign presence, and that
is providing sustenance and spiritual aid and little else of obvious
sustainable substance, unless you count bible classes as substance, which you
might – and it is here that I have to tiptoe lightly in my ecumenical ballet
shoes across the eggshell stage of evangelistic philanthropy. The point of this
piece is not to dissect the aid-for-spiritual-upliftment discourse – that is another
vast and highly charged subject.

In this instance however my finely tuned
antennae was assailed by the astonishing fact that the food that is being
dispensed to the disadvantaged Swazi children is actually imported from the
United States of America. Why should that be one may ask – and I did; and the
answer was that it is cheaper than purchasing it locally. Apparently it is
cheaper to import food from the USA by the container-load than it is to
purchase food stuffs locally – and that is why food staples are being imported
into a region that has the capacity to feed itself and have surplus.

There are a couple of issues here that are
begging to be unpacked . . .

I cannot for one moment subscribe to the
theory that, taking into account all the costs of freightage, demurrage, packaging,
protecting and palleting, import duties and so on that it is cheaper – dollar
for dollar as it were – to import foodstuffs from the USA to Southern Africa. And
this is aside from all the other annoying “hidden” environmental costs such as
embodied energy, carbon loading and green accounting. If this really
were the case then surely some very serious and strident alarm bells should be
ringing in the board rooms of charitable organisations let alone in the halls
of economic academia. In fact the idea is so patently absurd that it both beggars
belief or any further scrutiny.

Container shop laying off the Port of Durban, stacked to
the gunnels with pre-packed food parcels for Swazi
children.

It may be that the charity “hook” is for
legions of generous American office workers giving up their lunchtimes to parcel
up ration-packs for the starving fly-blown children of Africa. In other words
the only way that this particular form of largesse can be achieved is through
donation of “kind” rather than cash. But again this doesn’t stand up to any
serious scrutiny.

If you are a really serious donor you will
want to donate in an appropriate fashion – taking into account local conditions
and all other wider aspects of what we environmentalists refer to as the
receiving environment. Meaningful and considered charity should surely be directed
towards the recipients and not be some sort of a sop to the consciences or
social mores of the givers. If the only way of raising aid is by getting the donors
to physically package food-stuffs (which I really do doubt) then use it
locally, and god knows if CNN is to be believed there are enough potential
recipients in New Orleans alone. If locations on the African continent are the
desired aid target then examine how interventions can be best directed and
tailor efforts accordingly.

Productive Homestead in the Nkoyoyo/Hawane area

Oh, and by the way, these are
“interventions”; an apt description which alludes to “coming between” and
speaks of “interference.” Be of no illusion, however carefully planned it may
be, “aid” is disruptive.

In fact it doesn’t take much imagination to
see that far from being sustainable ill considered intervention is in danger of
promoting even greater levels of food aid dependency than the country is
already suffering. There are enough stories circulating about homesteads no
longer engaging in subsistence farming because they know that food aid is in
the offing, and I do not believe these tales to be apocryphal. The empathetic
support and promotion of sustainable farming must be paramount, and the
importation of basic food stuffs which can and should be sourced locally should
be immediately stopped.

As an illuminating matter of interest the
web page for this NGO extols mightily the virtues of its aid and sustenance to
the “hurting” children of Africa and it does not hold back on its spiritual
provenance or strength of beliefs. It gives a list of the personnel involved in
its activities. Under the heading of “missionaries” there are thirteen American
couples or individuals. Under the heading of “staff” there are fourteen
expatriates (single or couples), and there are 11 Swazis. What is revealing is
the fact that all the expatriates (missionaries or staff) are referred to by
forename and surname, but the Swazi staff are, with one exception, referred to
by forename only (oh, and one other has the appellation of “Make” which means
“Madame” or “Mrs” and which in this context smacks of condescension). This, for
me, speaks volumes about a web page that actually says very little and is
another indicator of the depth of understanding and empathy that this
organisation really has of the complex issues in which it is meddling.

Okay, it is not just daft misguided
amateurs who are creating havoc in the rural areas of Swaziland and elsewhere
in Africa. There are quite enough more formal organisations that are also
operating this most sensitive of sociological fields. And I readily admit that neither
the traditional nor the formal governmental structures are working well.

Ultimately the responsibility for these
foolish interventions must lie with Governments who do not have the political will
to say “thanks for the charity – but its got to go there, or there, and its got
to be done like this; otherwise no thanks.” Only then will this level of aid
make sense, and only then will the recipients actually start to truly benefit,
rather than being pawns in a game that they cannot participate in.

1 comment:

Very, extremely and most well said indeed. I wish so that I could be involved at the actual and literal and real grass roots level. Is there anyone doing Market Gardening 101 in the rural areas? Like you, I am incredulous that it is cheaper to freight in food aid than it is to grow a field of veg - nonsense. Or as Rae would say "stuff and nonsense"......